00:00Senator Young.
00:02Thank you, Chairman. Mr. Ituragi,
00:08what a complex environment. As I prepared for this hearing, I'm just struck by the enormous challenges
00:15there are going to be
00:18going forward to restore democratic rule
00:21in Haiti,
00:23which is relevant in light of its proximity to the Dominican Republic.
00:30Descendant to lawlessness in the country has been amplified.
00:36Already there are dire problems with organized crime.
00:41The U.S. Embassy in Haiti now evacuated of non-essential personnel.
00:48Our embassy in the Dominican Republic will be all the more important.
00:52How do you plan to work with the Dominican government to ensure there's no spillover of conflict from Haiti?
01:01Senator,
01:04as you know, being a U.S. Naval Academy graduate, we've got to have boots on the ground and the diplomatic front
01:11I'm going to borrow from Ambassador Jacobson.
01:13We need to approach the three-legged stool in tandem, security, economic development, and diplomacy.
01:19I am comforted that we finally have a U.S. Ambassador on the ground in Port-au-Prince.
01:25It is a very complex situation. I've been to Haiti.
01:30I can give you my personal observation from 30 years
01:35monitoring Caribbean affairs. What we
01:37hopefully should not do is implement the same strategy expecting a different outcome.
01:44Do you feel like there's a coordinated
01:47response
01:49across countries, certainly
01:51across
01:53within our government, but working with other governments as well regionally?
01:57I'll just throw out a bit of a fact pattern here.
02:04So the Dominican Republic has sealed the island's shared
02:08border and airspace. The Bahamas has launched a naval blockade to keep Haitians from fleeing the crisis by boat. The UK
02:17has sent a warship to ward off anyone seeking refuge in Turks and Caicos.
02:23Florida has increased Marine and aviation patrols.
02:27And then even with all of this, drug and gun smuggling continue to be widely reported issues in Haiti.
02:34So
02:35seems to me this can't be dealt with
02:39single-handedly by one ambassador. So is there a broader effort that you think is coming together?
02:46I believe there's a broader effort, and I'm personally hopeful that
02:51you all can make the
02:53appropriate decisions regarding the potential security,
02:56multinational security force on the ground. I can tell you, Port-au-Prince at night goes dark. They don't have any power.
03:03This is before the crisis.
03:04So for example, we need to take, sort of peel the onion in
03:09little by little and figure out how to bring security. Because I feel for the Haitian people,
03:15they just want to live and breathe, right? So most of the Haitian people are
03:21unfortunately hostages to transnational crime organizations and gangs. And I believe it's in our national security interest to
03:28be there and play a very constructive and proactive role.
03:32Would your counsel be to this committee
03:36that we should be focusing more assets in the region to combat illicit drug and arms trafficking?
03:44Sure answer, yes. But let me go back 25 years ago, because you may have
03:50benefited from training or otherwise visiting Roosevelt Road's Naval Station in Puerto Rico. Ever since we closed that base,
03:57the Caribbean is open borders. That's the U.S.-Caribbean border, including U.S.
04:01Virgin Islands and DR for that effect. Ever since we closed the base, the Caribbean became our very exposed third border.
04:10And that's the naval
04:12base, not Coast Guard stations? No, it used to be the largest Navy base outside the continental U.S. globally.
04:21How do you think the U.S. Coast Guard, just to stick with that smaller but highly relevant and important service,
04:29how should the Coast Guard be increasing cooperation with
04:34Dominican counterparts to prevent increased drug and arms trafficking?
04:39They are ramping up the efforts and they have the results to show, both on illegal drug interdiction and
04:48illegal immigration.
04:50But we need to do it also on the other side, which is the Haitian Navy has no ships.
04:56We recently gave them an old Coast Guard quarter. In the Dominican Navy,
05:01I understand from what I read, again, I haven't been fully briefed, but I understand that we have a very robust and growing
05:06cooperation and collaboration dynamic there.
05:11Thank you, sir. Chairman. Thank you.
05:14Chairman Cardin.
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